Question Time

Power Outages

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (14:12): My question is to the Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy. Does the minister stand by his comment that he is comfortable with the reliability and security of electricity supply in South Australia in light of recent blackout events and the fact that AEMO is forecasting reserve shortfalls this very month?

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Treasurer, Minister for Finance, Minister for State Development, Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy) (14:12): Yes, and there is—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Well, I have to say that I take it with a great deal of irony that members opposite who sold our assets—

Mr Marshall interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: That's right—predatory monopoly practices have nothing to do with higher energy prices. To add insult to injury, they want to ban the extraction of the very commodity we use to generate electricity and then they say it's all our fault. We didn't sell our assets, and we encourage and incentivise the mining of gas and we support renewables. The only commodity they support for the generation of electricity is coal, and unfortunately for us we don't have very much of it. But of course, when it comes to gas and incentivising gas, they are against it.

I have to say the guilty party in this entire debacle of the privatisation of our assets is members opposite. As much as they hate to be reminded, we are only 17 years into a 100-year contract that has locked in monopoly power to the people who own our electricity assets. What we are attempting to do is break up that monopoly, and we are doing it with renewable energy and we are trying to get more gas generators to South Australia. But members opposite, they hate gas and they hate renewables.

All they want is Victorian coal. That's all they want. They don't want us to be energy independent. They don't want us to have alternatives. All they want to do, to this very day, is defend those decisions that they made when they privatised our assets to people who now control our electricity generation. Rather than apologising to the people of South Australia for selling our assets, to this very day they still think it was a good idea.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: I call to order the members for Stuart, Hammond, Morphett, Hartley, Adelaide, Davenport and Morialta, the Minister for Agriculture and the Minister for Health. I warn the members for Mount Gambier, Chaffey, Hammond and the leader. I warn for the second and final time the member for Hammond, who has much to celebrate with the redevelopment of Murray Bridge racecourse. The leader.